Bipartisanship in the defense of big government

I’ve long been critical of both Republicans and Democrats for not looking for common ground to advance their own views of freedom in the United States. There are always issues of commonality, or at least issues that the other side’s rhetoric makes it impossible to oppose, that could be introduced by the party that is out of power.

When President Clinton claimed that he was the victim of an out-of-control prosecutor, Republicans should have introduced legislation protecting people outside the beltway from out-of-control prosecutors.

Democrats have decided, in the face of Trump, to continue blindly opposing literally everything he does, even things they called for earlier, such as firing James Comey.

But of course there is one policy they’re willing to work with Republicans on: increasing the power of an imperial presidency.

Why, after complaining that Trump is using the power of the White House to oppress Democrats, would Democrats introduce a resolution that makes it easier for Trump to act unilaterally? Why would they do this ahead of the 2018 elections, an off-year that traditionally goes in their favor?

Because they don’t believe what they’re saying. And because they know that regulations that cannot be repealed are a ratchet in favor of government control over everything. It is more important to Democrats to make it harder to repeal regulations than it is to maintain or even strengthen the ability to repeal Trump’s regulations.

I wrote during the election that the beltway establishment probably preferred a Donald Trump presidency to someone like Ted Cruz who would almost certainly heavily reduce Washington’s influence in our daily lives. Democrats are proving that with this legislation: backing Trump, and increased regulations, rather than introducing the kind of legislation Republicans always say they want in off years that would further reign in the imperial presidency.

The fact of the matter is, both their opposition to Donald Trump and their opposition to regulatory oversight stems from the same thing: a strong opposition to our right to govern ourselves.

“The law empowers Congress to review, by means of an expedited legislative process, new federal regulations issued by government agencies and, by passage of a joint resolution, to overrule a regulation.”

Do we really have two political extremes, or do we just have two very close sides that talk extremely different? Politicians can combat the increasingly extreme rhetoric in politics by, first, doing what they promise, and promising what they can do; and, second, by using rather than bypassing the legislative process that the founders designed specifically to dampen extremism.

“…it’s an attempt to ensure that we never again have the ability to disrupt the bipartisan D.C. cabal’s permanent supremacy by inserting a chief executive who refuses to kiss their collective Reid. This is a coup against us. It’s a coordinated campaign by liberals and their allies in the bureaucracy and media to once and for all ensure their perpetual rule over us.” (Memeorandum thread)

Just when I think I’m starting to understand the Democrats’ new policies post-2016, they come out of left field and support war in Syria. Are they flip-flopping because of failure theater or because they hate Trump?

From Lincoln on, Democrats have accused Republicans of their own failings: hate speech, violence, madness. And the more the left recycles the same serpent’s lies they used against President Lincoln, the more the left turns Trump into the new Lincoln.

When you’ve dismantled every other defense, what’s left except the whining? The fact is, Democrats can easily defend against Trump over-using the power of the presidency. They don’t want to, because they want that power intact when they get someone in.

Rather than automatically sunsetting all laws (which I still support), perhaps the choice of which laws have not fulfilled their purpose should go to an elected official who otherwise has little in the way of official duties.

In 1922, following the first world war, G.K. Chesterton discovered to his dismay that the evils of the scientifically-managed state had not been killed by its application in Prussia. Unfortunately, it was also not killed by its applications in Nazi Germany.

“If we can put a moon on the man, why cannot we devise a system whereby every state is billed by DC annually, and let the states compete for citizens to pay the taxes?” Moving from a system where the federal government taxes individuals to one where the federal government taxes state governments makes all of our lives a lot simpler and solves a lot of thorny civil rights issues as well.